Less than a week after he cheated a 64-year-old retired government employee of his pension savings amounting more than Rs. 2 lakh, a 30-year-old notorious ATM crook landed into the custody of the Navghar police in Bhayandar for his involvement in the crime. The incident took place at the ATM booth of a reputed multinational bank near the railway station in Bhayandar (east) when the senior citizen went there to withdraw money using his debit card on 7, June.
Posing as a customer-in queue, the cheat stepped in the booth and under the pretext of offering help kept observing the PIN that the victim was entering in the system after punching the card. The crook hurriedly left the booth, but not before replacing the senior citizen’s card with a swift sleight of hand. The card and its memorized PIN was later used to siphon-off Rs.2,06,187 cash from his account via multiple withdrawals and purchases between 7 to 9th June. The victim learnt about the withdrawals only after he got his passbook updated and registered a complaint at the Navghar police station.
A special team led by API Yogesh Kale under the supervision of senior police inspector- Milid Desai apart from scanning the footage captured by the CCTV cameras installed in and around the ATM booth, activated their core informer network and electronic surveillance apparatus. The team apprehended the accused identified as-Deepak Jha (30). Investigations revealed Jha’s involvement in two similar crimes in the region.
Apart from 37 credit/debit cards of various banks, the police recovered Rs. 48,500 cash and appliances worth more than Rs. 1 lakh. “ The accused has been remanded to police custody till 16, June. Further investigations were on.” said Desai, while appealing to people not to entertain strangers while carrying out transactions at ATM booths. Notably, the accused cleverly dodged the CCTV camera to avoid being clearly photographed.
